Tag Archives: Kemt

For about a week during the month of September 2018, nearly 100 writers and artists converged onto Cabot street in the South West of Montreal for the creation of a huge mural celebrating the graffiti writer and artist Scaner who had passed away a year earlier following a 8-year battle with cancer.

The 675 m2 (7250 sq. foot) mural is the creation of Scaner’s KG crewmates Zek (who wrote the letter outlines) and Stare, and features characters by Harry Bones and Axe Lalime. It was done on one of the two walls which had served as the canvas for the Scan You Rock mega-production 16 months earlier, a huge tribute to Scaner put together by his friends when they found out that he only had a short time left to live. Scaner’s own piece in the latter production was salvaged and has been integrated into the new mural which was designed around it. Barcelona artist and 4S crewmate Harry Bones created a Scaner-inspired character looming over the piece, and nearly a hundred of Scaner’s fellow writers and artists from Montreal and around the world filled the letters of his name with their own name pieces. Scan’s DA crewmate Axe Lalime created the end character, a clock reminding us that Time Is Gold.

The creation of the mural was organised by Scaner’s wife Karine ‘Kay’ Rogers and his friend Philémon (through the non-profit organization Mr CanDo) and made possible through the generous contribution of donors who thus helped pay for the rental of aerial work platforms, scaffoldings and safety equipment as well as the purchase of paint and the transportation of artists.

A tribute of this scale was unheard of in the world of graffiti and urban art before this. It is a testament to the love and respect that Scaner commanded from his peers, in Montreal and elsewhere in the world. The new mural is seen everyday by thousands of commuters on the Turcot Interchange, and photos and videos of it and its making have made it around the world through social media, cementing Scan’s place in local and international art and graffiti history.

The gallery below features photos of the complete wall as well as close-ups on various sections, including credits for all the artists involved. A few names are missing, any input is welcome.

The complete wall. Scroll down for close-ups on the wall’s different sections. Click to view image in bigger size.

The Scan You Rock tribute wall to Scaner; detail showing Harry Bones and Scaner’s original piece

Close-up on Harry Bones‘ contribution around Scaner‘s own piece salvaged from the Scan You Rock production from April 2017 (a few months before he passed away). Harry Bones was Scan’s crewmate in the 4S crew.

Over the weekend of 22-23 April 2017 the Montreal graffiti community got together to celebrate Scaner, one of this city’s best and most respected writers/artists, when they found out that he only had a short time to live. For the occasion, the walls of the MPC Papers building on the corner of Cabot and Gilmore in the South West (a Montreal graffiti hotspot) were completely redone by over two dozens of Montreal’s best writers and artists, plus friends of Scaner’s who traveled from as far as the USA and Barcelona for the occasion. All in all, nearly 40 new pieces were created during the weekend, they are all shown in the gallery below.

The building where the event took place has been in the past the site of graffiti gatherings such as Meeting Of Styles/Can You Rock. This is why the event was unofficially dubbed with the pun Scan You Rock and the name stuck.

In September 2018, for the first anniversary of Scaner’s death, the Cabot wall was completely redone by nearly 100 artists who came together to pay homage to their friend. A special photo article on this huge tribute wall can be seen here.

The “Jailspot” is the name given by graffiti writers and urban explorers to two contiguous abandoned buildings on Henri-Bourassa at the level of the now closed Tanguay prison. These buildings were not actually part of the closed prison, they belonged to Transport Québec who once used them as hangars for heavy machinery. They appear to have been used in the recent past as offices and warehouse space. The westernmost of the two is older than the other one which seems to have been built around 2006-2007. For the following years the latter new construction was used for sporadic warehouse sales.

Business must not have been very good, the buildings were left unused as early as 2011-2012 and signs of graffiti action started appearing, first outside then inside. Within a few years the two buildings were completely taken over by explorers and writers/artists. Everything except the warehouse at the front of the easternmost building quickly deteriorated, through the combined actions of vandals and rain/snow through broken doors and windows as well as collapsed roofs. The two buildings were finally gradually demolished over the spring and summer of 2016 to make space for the construction of controversial residential/commercial towers.

If you have any additional information about this spot, feel free to write in and contribute to this article.

The gallery below is divided by rooms and other areas where artists left their mark. The names of the rooms are not official ones, I just came up with them for comprehensive purposes. A plan of the spot can be seen below, at the top of the gallery.

Skor is mostly known for his affiliation with Ahuntsic’s SIK crew (alongside Shok, Narc and Tuna), but he also represents crews TBK (with Kemt, Sewk) and ITS (from Chicago). He returned to graffiti in 2013 after a break of about 10 years. He quickly gained the respect of his peers and of fans through his dedication to his art and his incredible talent. He constantly experiments with style and has evolved considerably since his return to the scene. He is also incredibly prolific, as evidenced in the photo gallery below which shows just a fraction of what he has given us since mid-2014.